Based on the S5S system? No thanks.

Do you remember SLA-L and the Oxford SLAcon?

@wfgdrmr I think I got the SLA skirmish game and RPG confused for a bit there.

I think one advantage that Alien (as a setting) has is that even if you remove the Alien there still is a lot of stuff to do.
It is exploration done by corporations with all sorts of reasons for things to go wrong even if the corporations don’t interfere with operations, because space travel itself is dangerous and unlike Star Trek/Star Wars the planets aren’t always perfect for humans.

Terminator … without Terminator is *eh* nothing ?
I’d argue that was why the movies themselves failed to be interesting after the second one as they all repeated the same plotline (terminators sent into the past to kill person X) over and over. Unless you add in a conspiracy that explains why none of the terminator tech salvaged results in new tech there isn’t much to do.

The fact that time travel exists within the Terminator universe creates its own paradoxes and associated headaches.

thanks for the info 😀
Didn’t realise it was picking up the pieces of another company.

Definitely agree that Aliens is a great movie, although the 3rd (where she lands on a prison planet has its moments).

Terminator is to me one of those movies/franchises that never needed sequels, because it is a bit too dependent on specific ideas/story arcs.
Alien can sort of branch out, but I have to admit that it was only after seeing a playthrough for that setting that it clicked.

I don’t know if the system S5S system is the best tool for the job. I know most studios tend to run either a custom ruleset of their own or re-skin a generic one (like D&D D20). With only one game in the system and an unknown entity at that (I had heard of SLA Industries as a niche RPG) it is hard to like/dislike it.

It is hard for me to define what a Terminator-game should be like. Terminators aren’t unstoppable machines in the future timeline. Tricky and tough yes, but not impossible.

Maybe one of the players can be a terminator in disguise ? That would limit the campaign options and not every group would want to play with an enemy within their ranks.

Most games can avoid time-travel as a feature, because they can claim such tech doesn’t exist. With Terminator we know it is possible and it is freakishly accurate as only a lack of data prevented them from zeroing in on the exact location & time.

Those are just my thoughts/ideas though.

“. The licence includes the rights to the canon presented in ‘The Terminator’ movie and all associated ‘The Terminator’ graphic novels published by Dark Horse.”
Looks like it’s only the first movie and a specific set of graphic novels …
Probably for the best, but it does suck that it doesn’t include the entire franchise if this is correct.
It’s the one thing that annoys me the most because ownership of IP is spread across various media and corporate entities, which means we are unlikely to ever see everything in print in the RPG.

Getting Gaska in is quite a catch, provided he can deliver with this system. I don’t know how much input he had on the mechanics in Alien RPG though. Such things are team efforts after all.

Must admit that if FLG had published instead of Nightfall games I would have been less paranoid, but then I did back ‘Things from the Flood’ and their Twilight2k RPG so I am a bit biased.

@wfgdrmr I’d say it is a ‘niche’ in as much that the average D&D fan is unlikely to have heard. Then again … Kult was equally niche and had about the same amount of backers so what do I know. 😀
btw : I got the SLA Industries RPG quick start. I can’t say I like the mechanics, but the setting is worth another look.
It does read a bit like Paranoiia meets Kult … it’s going on my list that’s for sure.

@tankkommander
it’s on my radar.
I don’t mind systems that have ‘degrees of succes’, because sometimes it matters how well/badly you succeed in doing things.
I do think S5S quickstart rules aren’t exactly ‘quick’.

Setting is more splatter horror than whatever it attempts to be. I’d blame the art direction as the cartoony/comic style doesn’t really match the horror of the setting.

//

Anyways … let’s stay on topic and talk Terminator.

The two big elephants in the room that need to be dealt with :
(1) how does character X from the movie translate to the game
T-800 should be unstoppable … but you can bet that players will find a way to min/max.
Especially given that S5S allows for ‘cinematic’ actions that (IMHO) do not fit with the Terminator movie at all.

(2) what happens if the players interact with the story ?
ie : what if they warn or kill Sarah Connor before the events in the first movie ?
Given how the events in the series more or less start/end with the Connor-family there’s bound to be issues once you mix in the pc’s.

How did the previous RPG deal with these ?